


Hunter and Game

by Snegurochka



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-03-05
Updated: 2009-03-05
Packaged: 2017-10-10 22:57:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/105332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snegurochka/pseuds/Snegurochka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Severus Snape used to think that he was the only spy capable of working against the Dark Lord. He was wrong.</p><p>12,800 words. NC-17. Snape/Fleur. Implied infidelity (re: Bill/Fleur), although that isn't the focus of the story. DH-compliant, ie: Snape's death. I assume that Fleur was 17, and thus of age, in GoF. Written for hp_springsmut. March 2009.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hunter and Game

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Flora for the beta help.

**xiii.**

She stared at the chalky grey headstone, her eyes dry beneath her black veil, and wondered if she could have saved him. She wondered what he would have said to her if she'd tried.

Maybe, "_Death happens, Miss Delacour. The sooner you learn that, the better_."

Or, "_If you could have– what? I hardly needed saving._" She almost smiled at that.

Possibly, "_What, exactly, do you think a teenage girl could do to defeat one of the most powerful wizards who ever lived? Oh, I don't know. Why don't you brush your hair and tighten your corset while you think about it?_"

No. He'd not said anything like that to her in some time. Men liked nothing less than being proven wrong, Severus included, but to his credit, he had learned to make an exception where she was concerned. He'd had no choice: he had been wrong about her, simple as that.

She hadn't brought flowers, because he would have hated them. Instead, she tapped her wand over a torn piece of parchment, affixing it to the headstone. The ink dried in the wind that swept over her hair.

_We did it_.

She walked backwards from his grave and almost convinced herself that she could have saved him.

*

**xii. **

"The girl has betrayed you, Severus."

Snape bowed his head. "My Lord?"

"She has brought me nothing on that family, Harry Potter's Muggle-loving friends. She remains secluded away with the husband." The Dark Lord paused, his voice softening. "You were once quite enchanted with her, were you not?"

Snape withheld his answer for three heartbeats, knowing how foolish – and unbelievable – it would sound to deny it. "An error in judgement, my Lord," he said quietly. "She is beautiful, and I have little..." He swallowed. "I do not have experience with women. As you know."

He focused on enhancing his credibility, his mind shielded to all but the images he needed the Dark Lord to see: Fleur sauntering past him in Knockturn, laughing as he stared and stumbled; Fleur emerging nude from the shower at Spinner's End, asking him for a towel as he flushed a violent red; Fleur rolling her eyes and falling to her knees before him in his kitchen as he nearly sobbed, clutching handfuls of her hair and spilling into her mouth almost instantly.

"It will not happen again," he added. The Dark Lord laughed, a high, sickening sound.

"Will it not?" He raised his voice. "Will she not flash her body at you again and make you fall all over yourself for the chance to have her?"

Shame was his best defence, Snape knew. He hunched his shoulders. "She is part Veela, my Lord," he began in a small voice, but the Dark Lord stood abruptly, crossing over to Snape and grasping his chin.

Forcing Snape's head up, the Dark Lord scrutinised him, nostrils flaring. "The Veela are fickle little bitches," he spat. "There was a time when I valued their cooperation, along with the giants and the merpeople, but that time has passed. They could have been brilliant in my service – an entire army with a skill more powerful than the Imperius curse." He released Snape's face and stalked away.

Snape pulled his cloak around himself, continuing to do his best to appear contrite. "I am surprised, my Lord. Like you, I thought they would be loyal. You have offered the girl great fortune and prestige for her work as envoy to her kind."

"She has made a fool of us both, then."

"Yes, my Lord." Snape added a hardened edge to his voice. "It seems she has."

The Dark Lord turned, his red eyes flashing. "I have no need for the Veela any longer," he said softly. "Now I see them for what they are."

"They are disloyal," muttered Snape, meeting the Dark Lord's gaze as he pushed another image forward in his mind, of Fleur riding him while murmuring a stream of filth in his ear about how good he was, the best she'd ever had, and about how they should run off together and leave the Dark Lord and his silly war behind.

"I will not have my efforts go for naught, have this entire venture lost, all because of the poison of one Veela slut." He spat the word at Snape, who dutifully schooled his own face into one of betrayed rage, clenching his fists at his sides.

"What shall we do with her?"

A slow, sickening smile spread over the Dark Lord's face as he tapped his wand in his free hand for several seconds. When he stopped, he pinned Snape in his gaze. "Kill her."

*

The doe Patronus appeared before her as she sank down in the bath, her hair knotted high on her head and her mind as far away as she could get it from the war around her. She blinked at it, her breath freezing in her chest. She would never get used to the sight of the thing, the magical proof of his devotion to another woman, no matter how many times it appeared before her.

"As far as he will ever know," it began in Severus's whispered tones, "you are dead. Do not leave Shell Cottage, especially not to come to Hogwarts. If you do, I shall kill you myself."

She let out a choked laugh at that, wiping eyes that had teared up without her consent. The doe lingered a second longer, and Fleur was certain its gaze swept over her naked body under the bath foam. She forced a smile at it, lifting her hand out of the water as if to stroke its translucent silver hide, but it floated above her before she could. Sighing, she dropped her hand again. "Thank you," she whispered. With a curt nod, the doe left as suddenly as it had appeared.

It was nearly over. Thank God. She had a house full of refugees – wandmakers and house-elves and mad neighbour girls with radish earrings, for God's sake – and almost more secrets to keep than she could bear.

She wondered if she would ever see him again. She refused to acknowledge the sharp burst of pain in that prescient, Veela part of her that told her she would not.

*

**xi. **

The kitchen at Spinner's End smelled of herbs and rat poison. Fleur sat stiffly in a chair, fiddling with the handle of her teacup and trying not to meet Severus's eyes. Across from her, she could feel him staring.

"We haven't much time," he said quietly, his voice as low and careful as always.

"I will be missed," she agreed, scraping her fingernail along a chip in the cup.

"There is no postponing it, then?"

She shook her head. "Molly will not hear of it. She is determined that we shall all pretend this war is not happening, that her son will have his wedding." She caught him nodding out of the corner of her eye.

"That family is full of fools," he said. "Earnest ones, but fools nonetheless."

"They are good people," she said wearily.

"Unlike us."

She finally raised her eyes and saw a second of naked emotion flashing through his before he could Occlude. She saw everything they had ever shared – all the hurried sex and the way the cords of his neck would strain as she gasped underneath him; all the whispered codes and clandestine Patronus messages; all the images of him standing at a distance, staring, while she moved through the kitchen at Grimmauld Place, pouring tea as Bill slid his arm around her waist.

She turned her head away and took a deep breath. "You are jealous," she said simply, trying to control her anger. "Why am I not surprised? Look who thought he could marry the Veela after all, hm?"

"Be silent," he hissed, waving his hand. "_Marry_. Yes, of course. Wouldn't it be romantic, the pair of us?" He snorted, flattening his palm out on the table. "You are advised not to anger me, Miss Delacour."

She snapped her head back towards him. "Oho! It is _Miss Delacour_ now, is it? I could hardly leave him after what Greyback did!" She gripped the edge of the table with both hands, leaning forward. "That is what they all expected me to do, the Veela who does not have loyalty, they say. So cruel in her heart. They wanted me to leave him like that, to tell him I could not love a man with such injuries. And then what would happen to me? Where is my reason to be here? I would go back to France and sit with my mother, waiting for this war to end?"

"That is the best idea you've had yet."

"Wait for you to be killed?" she snapped. "For Harry, for Bill and his family to die, all because I did not wish to have this inconvenience in my life? No."

He pressed his lips together.

"The Dark Lord already thinks I failed with the Veela," she continued, "that I am useless. If you wish for me to stay in his good graces, then this is the only way."

"It is too risky." Severus drummed his fingers on the table, avoiding her gaze. "The Dark Lord barely trusts you anymore."

She slammed her hand down. "Now you say this? _Now_? I am giving away my life for you, for this war, and this is what you say?" His fingers stopped moving, but he still stared across the kitchen rather than at her. "It is too late to tell me this. The Dark Lord believes I will learn about Harry from Bill's family. _I_ am the one who can help keep them safe now," she added. "Not you."

He finally turned towards her. "Don't you _dare_," he began, his voice cold.

She rose from her chair, carrying her teacup to the sink and dropping it in with a clatter before turning to face him again, her fingers curled around the edge of the counter behind her. "Oh, yes," she said softly, tilting her head to the side. "I forgot. I do not understand what you have been through, is that what you will say? How difficult it was for you to _kill_ for the cause."

He shoved his chair back and stalked over to her, pinning her against the counter and letting several long seconds tick by before he spoke. One hand curled tight around her wrist, while the other traced her jaw with the pads of his fingers. "So beautiful," he murmured, "and so stupid."

Moistening her lips, she curved them into the smile he was expecting. "So angry," she shot back, "and so useless." She slid one hand free from his grip and moved it between their bodies and into his robes, brushing her knuckles over his abdomen. His fingers tightened along her jaw line, tilting her head up. He gazed down at her, his eyes moving in quick, tiny motions as though memorising her face.

He closed the distance between them, grazing her lips and pressing his body further into hers as the counter dug into her back. She dipped her fingers lower into his trousers while he kissed her. One finger caught on the head of his cock as it filled, and she scraped her nail over it, the pad of her index finger slippery with moisture where it paused over his slit.

Gasping into her mouth, he deepened the kiss, his fingers at her jaw flattening out until his whole hand cradled the side of her face. She let him devour her, knowing how much he needed it and how much she couldn't bear to deny him, not when it might be the last time. When he broke away, she curled the fingers of her free hand into the fabric at his chest, holding him close.

"I will not fuck you, not anymore," he breathed against her ear even as his hand slid down her hip. "But I will always protect you."

She caught his wrist and held him still, her breasts heaving against his chest. "I do not require fucking _or_ protecting," she replied. She could feel his hint of a smile curve against her cheek.

"You require both," he assured her. "I should know."

"Oh?" The tip of her finger circled the head of his cock again, and Severus groaned before reaching between them and pulling her hand free. He guided it to his mouth and sucked her finger between his lips, and she was the one who gasped. She closed her eyes as his tongue pressed against the pad of her finger, her body thrumming with arousal and tension.

"_Oh_," he repeated in reply as he kissed her fingertip one more time and then lowered it, his voice laced with sarcasm. "I know you better than anyone."

"And I you."

He paused. "Is that so? I know, for example, that you will insist on flying as one of the seven Potters."

She wet her lips, meeting his gaze. "Do you, then. Well. _I_ know that if you are chasing us and have the chance to bring me down–" She tilted her head up and licked lightly at his bottom lip. – "that you will not do it."

His response surprised her. He brushed a stray strand of hair from her face, tracing it along her cheek before tucking it behind her ear. "You're likely right about that," he said quietly.

"Do not get attached, that is what you told me," she murmured, her hands still buried in the folds of his clothes, as if letting go would release him forever.

He pulled back, disentangling himself from her at last and smoothing his robes down. His face had resumed its usual blank expression. "I wouldn't dream of it," he drawled, leaning in one more time. "My congratulations to the bride, by the way," he murmured.

She narrowed her eyes at him.

"Remember: if you are to do this, then the Dark Lord must believe that marrying the Secret-Keeper of Shell Cottage will gain you access to crucial information about Harry. It's the one place he will feel safe; the Dark Lord knows this." His lips brushed her ear. "He cannot get that level of access anywhere else right now. Not even from me."

She pushed down the tremour that passed through her. Instead, she swatted at him, lifting her chin and tossing her hair over her shoulder. She gave him a broad smile, planting one hand on her hip. "I knew it."

He rolled his eyes and pointed at the door. "Now get out."

Gathering her things, she headed for the front door with as much swagger as she could muster, her heart quietly breaking. She swallowed as her fingers curled around the doorknob.

"Fleur," he called unexpectedly, not looking at her.

She turned.

"If this plan of yours doesn't work, he _will_ kill you."

She pressed her lips together, dropping her gaze. "And you will always protect me?" she murmured.

Against her better judgement, she looked up again after a long moment to see him sagged against the counter in the kitchen, his fingers kneading his forehead.

*

**x. **

"An Unbreakable Vow."

She repeated the words so calmly that Snape was tempted to ask her if she even knew what it was. "Yes," he said instead. He pulled his trousers on and then sat back down on the bed, bare-chested. He leaned forward, his elbows sinking against his knees as his fingers clasped together.

"To protect the Malfoys."

Snape sighed. "Draco, yes." He felt her rise from the other side of the bed and walk around it, stopping in front of him. He glanced up.

"And Narcissa?"

Her accent caught over the rolled _r_ and the surplus of _s_ sounds, and Snape very nearly melted, reaching out to drag her back down to the bed with him. "It is for her as well, yes," he managed.

She was quiet for a long moment. He watched as she moved about the dismal, rented room, gathering her clothes and dressing herself. First her knickers, a tiny piece of lace that Snape would have rolled his eyes at had he not enjoyed peeling them off her only an hour ago. They settled over her hips with a soft _snap_ before she threaded her arms through her matching bra and secured the clasp. One stocking, sliding steadily up to her thigh, then the other. She paused at that point to stroll over to the mirror, rearranging her hair and pointing her wand at her lips to renew their coral colour.

Warm blonde hair cascaded over her shoulders and down her back as she shook it out, her breasts nearly spilling out of her bra and the lace of her knickers barely covering her bottom. And she was going to stand there and get jealous of cold, haughty _Narcissa_? Snape almost laughed. "Come here," he said, watching the smooth muscles of her shoulder blades tense at the command. She glanced at him as she fastened one earring.

"What do you want with me now?" She arched an eyebrow.

"Come _here_."

She hesitated, regarding him, before turning back to the mirror. "No."

"Ah, this is it, then," he bit out. "The teenage girl playing games far beyond her brains or means has finally decided to pitch a diva fit."

She finished fastening the other earring before glancing back at him. Without a word, she walked across the room and lifted her skirt from the floor, stepping into it one foot at a time and sliding it methodically up her legs and over her hips. When it was clasped, she bent to retrieve her blouse from the armchair where it had landed, half inside out, after he'd shoved it from her shoulders. One arm through, then the other.

As she buttoned it, beginning at the bottom, Snape's gaze remained fixated on the swell of her breasts as they disappeared under the smooth fabric.

"Far beyond," she murmured to herself, nodding, as she stepped into her pumps and turned to face him at last, both hands on her hips. "So, your Vow, then. It is done."

He lifted his chin.

"And I am living at the Burrow with awful little girls who hate me, just to prove to the Dark Lord that my spells still work on men."

His nostrils flared, but he held her gaze and said nothing.

"Do you know what he does when he thinks my spells have stopped working on men," she asked quietly, "or that I have stopped trying?"

His fingers pressed together hard enough to bruise.

"He tests me," she continued, her voice matter-of-fact. "It was Rookwood last time, and before that–" she tapped her finger over her lips, pretending to think – "Yaxley, perhaps. Well, their names do not matter."

A rush of blood scalded his heart. "You've not told me this," he managed, swallowing.

She walked towards him and leaned forward, her hands still planted on her hips. "Oh, stop trembling, Severus. It is not what you think. Yours is the only Death Eater cock I will accept. But he does test me." She stood up again. "If his minions do not declare their love and propose to me before ten minutes, he is quite upset."

Snape exhaled in relief before glaring up at her. "You continue to pass these tests, I gather?" he said icily.

She moistened her lips, the barest touch of pink tongue sliding over them. "Of course," she murmured. "He is quite pleased with me, in fact. I shall have much to report after Harry leaves for school, hm?"

"You are there to protect him," grumbled Snape, rising at last from the bed and grabbing his own discarded shirt.

"Oh." She tilted her head to the side and gave him her best pout. "But I thought I was only a teenage girl playing games with– what was it, Severus? Beyond my brains. Pitching this fit for you."

A sudden rage blazed through Snape. "You are nineteen years old!" He fumbled to button his shirt halfway before storming across the room and grabbing his robe to throw on over top. "You've been at this for what, a year? Two? You've no idea what–"

"_Don't_," she warned, narrowing her eyes at him. "My God. An Unbreakable Vow. _That_ is what all your years of experience taught you to do?"

He sighed, rubbing his eyes. "I had no choice."

"No, you never do," she muttered as she brushed past him, swiping her purse from the dresser. Her hand tight on the doorknob, she paused, not turning around. "And how old were you," she added, "when you did your best work in the last war?"

Snape glanced at her from under his hand. "The last war, need I remind you, ended in disaster."

"No," she said, "I do not mean that. Not your mistakes later. Your _best_ work."

Snape closed his eyes. Damn her. "I took the Mark at eighteen and was thoroughly disillusioned by twenty," he admitted.

She turned her head at last, her eyelashes lowered and just a smudge of her flushed cheek visible over her shoulder. He walked towards her and placed a hand on her shoulder, gently turning her. She responded with a quiet sigh, leaning back against the door.

She slid her fingers into his shirt and pulled him close, her lips hovering over his. "Would you ever make a Vow like that to me?" she asked softly.

A weaker man might have crumbled, but Snape knew her too well by now. "No," he murmured, tracing her cheek with his index finger.

She smiled against his lips. "Good." She kissed him, a wholly different kind of kiss than the hungry, panting one she had met him with at the door earlier. When she pulled back, she rested her forehead against his. They stood there together for several long, peaceful moments before she spoke again. "If you could possibly find a way neither to kill, nor to die," she murmured, "I would appreciate it."

He let out a deep breath, suddenly overcome with weariness, and nodded.

*

**ix. **

Fleur was liaising with Madame Maxime in France the night Sirius Black died.

She hadn't known him well and was more concerned for Harry than any of the others when she received the news from Bill. On the heels of his letter, though, she had also received another, this one from Severus. It contained only two lines.

_I cannot even protect the people I hate.  
You had better stay where you are_.

She held the parchment to her chest and flattened it out.

"More letters from England?"

She grimaced as Madame Maxime entered the room, her heels dainty in fashion but of a size large enough to crater the floor. Eyeing Fleur, she sighed.

"What is it about this one, child? You may have any man you wish, or any woman, for that matter."

Fleur read the two scrawled lines again, flushed with emotion at everything they didn't say. "Yes. But he is not a man I ever would have wished to have."

"Ah." Madame Maxime nodded. "And therein lies the appeal."

Fleur smiled.

"He is enchanted with you, or, I should say–" she nodded down at Fleur's chest – "with _those_. Just like every other man."

But Fleur shook her head, folding the letter methodically and sliding it into her bra. "No, he's not."

Madame Maxime waved her wand to summon a cup of espresso, gripping it between her large fingers. She gave Fleur an incredulous look, but Fleur stood her ground.

"You know how it works," she insisted, "what it takes for men to fall under the Veela influence."

"And you mean to tell me that a man like him does not fit the criteria perfectly?"

She leaned back against the kitchen counter and folded her arms over her chest, considering. "I was surprised as well," she said at last, smiling as she thought of him. "But no. He does not."

*

**viii. **

The soft orange light from the torch burned up her thigh. Severus followed it with his tongue, his arm sliding under her leg as fingers caressed the length of muscle leading down from her hip. His mouth dipped between her spread legs and she gasped, arching her back. He glanced up at her, shaking his head almost imperceptibly in warning. She bit down on her lip to stay quiet.

Downstairs, she could hear boots pacing around the library and Order members squawking at each other for another failure to gain intelligence from the Ministry, or a new danger to Harry Potter, or whatever else they squabbled about these days. Severus's tongue slid over her clitoris as one of his long fingers pushed inside her, and she stopped caring whatsoever about what the Order was doing.

His finger stroked gently in and out of her as his mouth moved up, his lips dragging over her abdomen and up to her breasts. She gasped soundlessly, spreading her legs further, and he raised his eyes to hers, his face as unreadable as always. Watching her carefully, he let his finger slide out of her and move up, beginning to press small circles over her clit. He moved with aching slowness, his eyes flickering down to watch what he was doing, watch the way her chest heaved and her stomach muscles clenched, and then rising up to her mouth, staring at her parted lips before meeting her eyes once more.

"Quiet," he whispered, his voice barely more than a breath, and she knew what he would have said to her if he dared speak plainly. He liked nothing better than to take her when he thought she was still stained with the come of other men, wanting her to remember _his_ touch, not theirs, and leave his own imprint on her body to nullify the others. That was how it had begun for them, with Severus smelling Karkaroff on her skin, and that was how it would end, she figured, now that he wanted nothing more than to send her back downstairs to Bill with Severus's semen dripping down her thighs.

She came at the thought of all the men who wanted her, Severus most of all, with his finger still swirling in ever-increasing motions. She clutched at him and felt her face crumple, sagging back against the edge of the table in the upstairs corridor as she tried not to moan. He freed his cock quickly and paused only to trace his soaked finger over it, glancing down with a haunted expression on his face.

With a light touch, she reached out to tilt his face towards her again, wetting her lips and giving him a small nod of permission. This tiny part of the Veela influence _did_ affect him, she knew – that which made men desire her beyond all reason but also doubt themselves the moment they had her. Usually, Severus was immune to such games; his occasional lapse only spoke of his increasing insecurity over not being able to have her to himself anymore, not completely.

She guided his chin down and kissed him at the moment he pushed inside her, gasping with him and licking at her own taste on his tongue. He bit at her lower lip and held himself still, buried fully, with his hands grasping her thighs. She let her head fall back to the mirror behind them as he started to move, his cock thick and full inside her. His arms slid up her thighs, hips, and around her back. He pulled her forward to the edge of the table, pushing in deep and letting his nose brush up the side of her face.

"Quiet," she whispered in his ear as his control began to crumble, and he sucked in a breath – stopping a harsh laugh in its tracks, she guessed. He pulled her over his cock, the strokes slow, steady and silent. Lifting his face from where it was buried in her neck, he held her gaze, their eyes locking as their lips parted and the cords of his neck began to tense. His eyes closed only at his moment of climax, fluttering out of control as his lips mashed together and every muscle in his body tightened.

She felt the warm splash of his come release inside her and she clenched her body around it, desperate to hold onto him a moment longer.

When he opened his eyes, his face was once again schooled in a perfect mask. She almost envied how easily he did it. He pulled out slowly, ran a hand over his cock and mouthed a silent cleaning charm, and finally stepped back to refasten his trousers. When he was done, he trailed one finger along the inside of her thigh where she sat on the table catching her breath, and he leaned in close.

"What news for him?" he murmured, his voice low in her ear.

"The goblins are angry with the Ministry," she whispered, her hand slipping around the back of his neck. "They think my _Eeenglish_ is still too terrible to hear what they say, so they speak freely."

He tugged at her earlobe with his teeth, and she gasped.

"Be careful of this Umbridge," she continued, feeling him shiver under her warm breath. "The magical creatures do not trust her, and if they do not trust her, they do not trust the Ministry. The Dark Lord might move in on them soon."

He nodded into her neck, pausing to brush his lips over her cheek once more before lifting his head. He stepped back and smoothed his clothing again, raising his eyes to hers for only a brief moment. She closed her legs and pulled her robe around her naked body, trying to meet his telltale expression of neither smiling nor scowling.

Finally, he dropped his gaze and seemed to will the flush to drain from his face before setting off downstairs to join the meeting.

*

**vii. **

The Dark Lord himself did not touch women. Fleur had known this much before she'd ever agreed to Madame Maxime's first scheme. Had it not been so, she liked to think she would not have got herself involved with his Veela envoys at all, but perhaps she overestimated herself.

His service bled with intoxicating power, after all. A woman who was already as powerful and privileged as she was should have found it hard to resist.

"What news from France?" he would say to her conversationally after every trip she made to the continent. Ordering her to stand in the centre of a bare room, he circled her like a predator, still becoming accustomed to his new body. He would reach his long, thin fingers out towards her hair where it fell down her back, without ever touching it.

"Productive, my Lord," she would always answer, even though increasingly, it had been no such thing. The Veela were not organised. They had no leaders or demands, and even locating them at all was akin to trying to round up all the blondes in Paris, or all the women with shaved legs in Nice. She and Madame Maxime had known this from the beginning, of course; the key had been to keep the Dark Lord from finding out, while gaining as much information from him about his other operations as she could.

"And when might we expect this Veela army?"

His sarcasm was dangerous; he was doubting her too often these days. With his mind fixed on that Prophecy, nothing else would appease him. She needed a new angle, something to offer him when the day came to admit defeat with the Veela.

There was Viktor, of course, but he had been scarce since the Tournament and surely knew what had happened between her and Karkaroff. It would be best to steer clear of him. There was Charlie, as well, with his muscles and freckles and all those lovely dragons. Alas, he – much like the Dark Lord, ironically – also tended not to bother with women. Her efforts there likely wouldn't get her very far.

He might have been perfect: his brother was Harry's best friend, after all. What better way to prove to the Dark Lord that she could deliver the boy to him? Severus would not like this idea; she was quite sure of that. He already liked to think that she belonged to him, no matter how many times she told him it was not wise to do so.

Later in the summer while she was still pretending to recover from the Maze, though, the opportunity presented itself to her on a silver platter. Charlie came to see her at her parents' house.

"There's my girl," he drawled, tucking his hands into the back pocket of his worn jeans as he strolled into her room, her mother glaring disapprovingly from the door. "How're you feeling?"

She huffed, pulling her silk dressing gown around herself and slumping in a wide armchair. "Terrible." She pouted.

He grinned, shaking his head. "Would that be a physical terrible, or a _pride_ terrible?" he teased.

She glared at him. A couple of conversations about dragons several months ago, and he thought he knew her so well. Maybe he did. She didn't usually bother hiding her true feelings about any given situation – something for which Severus cursed her since he'd begun trying to teach her Occlumency.

"Taken down by a simple Stunner," continued Charlie, shaking his head. "Embarrassing, that. I thought you were the cleverest witch at that whole bloody school of yours."

"Oh, be quiet," she muttered. _None_ of them had known what that awful man had been up to; it was hardly her fault for getting caught off guard.

Laughing, he perched himself on the arm of her chair and brushed his fingers over her forehead, pushing the hair out of her eyes as he gazed down at her. "Think I know what might make you feel better, though," he murmured, a grin dancing at his lips.

She knew exactly what would make her feel better, but he was in England and furious with her for taking so many risks for the Dark Lord so early in her service, so that was out of the question, at least for now.

"Come on in, Bill," called Charlie, turning to the door.

Fleur raised an eyebrow.

"He's been asking about you for months," whispered Charlie as he stood. "Go on, work some magic. You know you want to." He winked at her before gesturing his brother inside.

One glance at this Bill told her that he wouldn't be quite as compliant as some. He almost had flashes of Severus to him, with a strong will and allegiance to logic and reason over rumour or belief. She gazed up at him and felt the magic begin to swirl through her body, shimmering on the verge of finding something about him to latch onto.

"Hello," he said quietly, inclining his head. "I hope you don't mind us just–" he waved his hand, frowning at Charlie over his shoulder. "Charlie insisted on dropping in."

Ah, there it was. A modicum of insecurity. That was all she needed.

"How can I mind," she purred, "when the world today has brought me such beautiful men?" She could picture the way Severus would be pinching the bridge of his nose right now if he knew what she was doing – shaking his head as though she were an errant child he was forced to abide.

A flush crept up Bill's neck. She took his hand in both of hers and stroked gently over his palm.

"And how is Harry?" she asked honestly, listening with patience and nodding in all the right places as Bill began to answer.

When she next saw the Dark Lord, he greeted her as he always did ever since Severus had first introduced them after the Tournament. "What news from France?" he said quietly, gazing down at her.

"More productive than usual, my Lord," she answered, bowing low.

He waited.

"My Lord, you are aware of my abilities with men," she began, ignoring the snickers on the edges of the room. "Would it please you if I used them on those who are closest to Harry Potter?"

*

**vi. **

Karkaroff was as good as dead, Snape had not answered the Dark Lord's summons and now, to top it all off, the blasted girl thought this was _her_ war to fight.

"Is he really back?" she asked Snape breathlessly one summer night when they met on the edge of the Forest.

"Yes, and _no_, you may not ask what you are going to ask," he said abruptly, turning to go.

"You do not know what I will ask."

He glanced back. "Yes, I do. But it is over, Miss Delacour." He waved his hand. "Everything is over."

A flash of hurt seared across her face, but it was gone two seconds later. She only folded her arms over her chest and glared at him. "Everything is only beginning, you mean."

"Everything you thought you knew," he said slowly, "is over. You and Maxime and your plotting is over. Your whispering about Karkaroff is over. This is something you cannot even imagine." He could scarcely imagine it himself. The Dark Lord was back. Merlin help them all.

"The war is only _beginning_," she insisted.

He gazed at her for a long time. She was fresh-faced, eager and entirely too naïve, but also quicker with a wand and cleverer with a range of spells than anyone would ever give her credit for – that much he had learned over the past nine months.

"Have you figured it out yet?" she pressed.

He raised his eyes to the canopy of trees overhead and sighed. "Figured what out?"

She stepped closer to him but did not touch him. "How perfect I am," she murmured.

He glanced down at her.

"Not just at _that_." Her mouth curled up into a seductive smile, and Snape grit his teeth against any further betrayal by his own body. "Do you know what they will say about me now, after this Tournament?"

"Miss Delacour," he began, "I have larger problems at the moment than the gossip of idle teenagers."

"Not just teenagers," she snapped, her demeanour shifting. "_Everyone_." She paused. "I failed, no? I am terrible at magic. I could not save even my own sister. I could not fight anything in the Maze." She bit out each accusation.

He rubbed his eyes. "I don't have time for–"

"You are the only one who knows differently."

His fingers stilled over one eyelid.

"You are the only one who believes I am good at anything. Who can look beyond this." He dropped his hand in time to see her gesture over her body, her face hard.

"I've not looked beyond _that_ very often," he said with a shrug, hoping his coolness would put her off. He should have known better.

Planting her palm flat against his chest, she shoved him back until he hit a tree. "Introduce me," she said slowly, her gaze piercing his. "I can help."

His lips parted to take in a bit more air as he realised what she was saying. Christ. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"You have a Dark Mark on your arm that glows brighter now than when we met – I know _that_."

He closed his eyes. She had always known too much, since that first night they'd seen each other. "Seducing Death Eaters is not a job most teenage girls want," he muttered at last, but she didn't miss a beat.

"It will be more than that."

Snape snorted. "Unless he has changed very much since the last war, the Dark Lord will not have much interest in your charms, either, my dear."

"_More_ than that." Her eyes flashed at him, and she pointed her finger back at the castle. "That Goblet was the first _thing_, person, whatever, since Madame Maxime to recognise my abilities for what they are. No one else does this. _No one_. I can do anything he needs, and who will suspect me?" She paused, waiting until he met her gaze. "I can do anything _you_ need," she added softly.

"I do not need a sidekick."

If she recognised that as an admission that she had been right about his activities, she didn't let on. She only reached up and threaded her fingers through his hair, watching as they slowly slid down to his shoulders. "Is that all I would be?" she murmured, leaning in to brush her lips against his.

He pulled away before the kiss deepened. "You are young and foolish," he said curtly.

She glared at him, one hand on her hip. "I subdued a trained Death Eater who wished to kill you," she shot back.

"Child's play," he snarled, "compared to what you would face in the Dark Lord's service." He glared at her for several seconds until she dropped her eyes, finally at a loss, it seemed, for what to say. Running his hand over his face, he turned away. "Miss Delacour," he began.

"Fleur."

He glanced down to find her watching him again, her jaw set with a new determination.

"My name is Fleur. You may use it."

He lifted an eyebrow.

"I am an adult. I have experience with Dark magic and dangerous situations. I am one of the three best witches and wizards to come out of the magical school system of Europe. And in case you would rather recruit from the other two, I can remind you that one is dead, and the other would never help you." She paused for breath, her eyes piercing him. "And if none of these things convince you, there is this." She moved closer to him, reaching her fingers up to brush over his jaw. She studied his face for a long moment. "I know that you actually prefer teaching Hufflepuffs to Ravenclaws because they are more obedient. I know that you enjoy researching potions but become bored with brewing them. I know that you send your laundry to the house-elves twice per week, and you scold the little one if your favourite trousers are not pressed properly."

He tensed against her, breathing shallowly, but she pressed on. Her fingers tightened on his jaw as she made him face her to listen.

Her voice rose. "I know that you miss your mother terribly, and that you were once so in love with a woman you could not have, that it nearly destroyed you."

"Enough!"

"I know that you are ashamed to be attracted to me," she continued fiercely, "but that you have not felt so good about a partner, so trained to their mind and heart as well as their body, perhaps ever in your life, as you do with me."

He grabbed her by her shoulders and shoved her away, breathing hard. "I said, _enough_."

"How do I know all of that?" She watched him carefully from two paces away. He stared at her. "Because men will _tell things_ to a beautiful woman," she said curtly. "This is my skill. This is where the others cannot help you."

"We have been over this," he snapped. "You have insisted that I am not under any Veela spell."

"You are not, no." Her voice softened. "You have told me these things because you wished to do so, because you trust me."

He closed his eyes. "You have been a sexual convenience. Nothing more."

"That is not true," she murmured, "and you know it. But imagine the information I can get from men who are less confident than you, men who will fall to my magic so easily because they require love so badly."

He shook his head, even though he knew she was right. "Go back to France. Move on with your life."

"_No_." She enunciated the word carefully.

They were silent for a long time, and when Snape finally opened his eyes again, his chest tightened at the vision of her, flushed and angry and dedicated in ways he'd never seen in another person before. If he didn't agree to this, he could tell she was likely to go behind his back and try to infiltrate the Death Eaters in her own way. That could only end in disaster. "You understand," he began quietly, "that if I bring you to the Dark Lord as an ally, an envoy to the Veela, perhaps, that I am placing us both at great risk."

She nodded.

"And you understand that should you disappoint him or worse, _betray_ him–" he caught her gaze and held it – "that I will not think twice about throwing you to the wolves, if it means saving my own position."

She hesitated for a moment but then nodded again. "And this?" she asked, stepping forward to place her hand on his chest, blinking up at him. She tilted her head up and leaned in to brush his lips. "Do not tell me it is nothing, that it is over."

A shiver slid down his spine at the taste of her, and he framed her face with his hands before he could stop himself, deepening the kiss. He had completely lost his mind; there was no other excuse for this. With great effort he finally lifted his mouth away, but he enfolded her in his arms, resting his chin on the top of her head. Dammit. "It's too dangerous now," he murmured into her hair.

As soon as the words left his lips, he regretted them. He felt her face shift where it was pressed into his shoulder and knew she was smiling. Danger, of course, was exactly the appeal.

*

**v. **

The boys at breakfast performed just as Fleur knew they would: knocking over glasses of juice in an attempt to get closer to her; offering to rob Gringott's for her if she desired money or jewellry; gazing at her with stars in their eyes and trying to speak through the cotton in their mouths.

She saw Severus out of the corner of her eye, watching from a short distance. Finally, he walked past and bellowed at the boys, scattering them to their own tables. He paused behind her chair for a moment, and she thought she heard him inhale deeply.

Later, as the others shuffled out, he caught up with her near the door and steered her to one side. He stood apart from her with his arms crossed, talking down to her and appearing to any outside observers, Fleur gathered, as though he were reprimanding a student.

"Your famous restraint?" she whispered, and he shook his head.

"Nothing."

"Would you kill the goblins and empty the vaults for me?" she purred, moistening her lips.

His eyes followed the movements of her tongue, but he shook his head again. "No."

"Are you overcome by the urge to marry me and cart me off to your house to sit like a doll, waiting on you hand and foot?"

He blinked. "No." He paused. "That one is new."

She waved her hand. "That one did not sound quite like that when he said it." She gave him a coy smile. "You are close to me now. So, what do you feel – nothing?"

He was silent so long that she began to glance over her shoulder, certain the crowd must be thinning and their conversation obvious. He scrutinised her, his face unreadable. "No," he murmured at last in a voice that made her fingertips tingle. "Certainly not nothing."

*

**iv. **

After the Yule Ball, Snape was appalled to discover that he could hardly help himself when she was near.

"This is mad," he panted, falling back to the bed and wiping his hand over his face. He could scarcely catch his breath. "You're a _child_."

"Ah, I see. Well. Maybe I should tell you that women with Veela blood live only to age forty, hm?"

He glanced sideways at her across the rumpled sheets. "So that makes you middle-aged?"

She smiled.

He pushed himself up on one elbow, letting the silence swell between them for a moment. "Not a lick of truth to that, is there?"

She laughed, easing him back down and crawling over top of him, biting kisses down his chest. "Oh come, Severus. You cannot tell me you were not fucking a beautiful older person when you were my age. Someone – what is this phrase? – taking you under his feather."

"Wing," supplied Snape.

"What?"

"His wing – that's the expression."

"Ah! Then you do not deny it."

"I– you tricked me."

She grinned, moving her legs to straddle him. She lowered herself enough to brush against him with slow, steady gyrations until he was hard again. "So," she breathed as she reached down to position him, sinking down on his cock so slowly he closed his eyes and groaned. "This _he_. Was it the headmaster?"

"God, no. Stop that." He gripped her hips and thrust up.

Her hair fell onto his chest as she leaned down to kiss his neck. "Hm. Abraxas Malfoy?"

Snape had been about Fleur's age now when he'd first met Lucius's father; that much was true. "You think I like the blond and the persistent, do you?" he growled.

She laughed. "The powerful, too."

"Is that you, then?"

She sank down again and held him there, not letting him thrust. "Oh, you've no idea," she breathed, warm over his chest. Slowly, she began to rotate her hips, working up a steady, maddening rhythm until her thighs began to rise and fall again, taking him in fully and riding him hard. As she did, she continued to list off the names of every witch or wizard twenty years older than Snape and in whose circles he might have run.

He came just as the name _Orion Black_ fell from her lips, and his fingers pinched at her hips and arse as he held her flush to him and pulsed inside her. God.

"You are not actually as old as you think you are," she murmured to him through tousled hair. Before he could think of a retort or offer another reason why they shouldn't be together, she'd pushed her hair back off her face and risen to pad across the room for her clothes.

"It is your magic," he muttered. "Nothing more. Were I to remove you from my presence, ensure our paths never crossed within the castle, I would no longer desire you."

She stilled, her robes twisting in her hands. When she finally glanced over her shoulder at him, her expression was unreadable. "Do you really think this, still?"

"Of course."

"Hm." She pulled her robes on and fastened them. "And you seemed so clever."

Snape pushed himself up on his elbows. "Excuse me?"

She flipped her hair off her shoulders. "Tomorrow at breakfast. Walk past me while those boys are there, flittering around." She waved her hand. "Watch what they do, and then look at yourself."

"If I am more restrained," he said with a roll of his eyes, "it is simply because I am not a hormonal teenager."

"Or because you are already fucking me?"

Snape bit down over his next words.

Fleur laughed. "It is neither of those things," she insisted. "Do what I said, and then we shall talk about what is my magic, and what is not."

*

**iii. **

The Veela girl was both too foolish and too clever, and Snape needed to take action on both counts. If only he knew how.

Watching Davies paw at her as the Champions danced was not helping.

Watching that pervert, Karkaroff, leer at her was not helping either. Snape understood more about that man's loyalties tonight than ever before, after their conversation, and it sickened him.

The girl moved through the Hall like a perfect doll, her gown swishing around her dainty heels and her back arched into Davies's strong hold. She wore a benign, pleased expression sculpted from clay, her smile broad but fixed and her eyes alive but distracted.

He had to physically restrain himself from stepping forward every time she glided by. He cursed himself, rubbing at his eyes. Damn the Veela and their blasted magic. It was nearly worse than the Imperius curse. Merlin help them all if the Dark Lord ever figured that out and managed to organise them.

When the dance ended, he saw her beg Davies for a drink and then, glancing behind her, make her way through the crowd to Karkaroff. Bloody, fucking hell. Snape's gaze followed her every move as she slid her hand up Karkaroff's chest and laughed against his ear, leaning in close. Not this, not again. Of all the reckless, stupid –

"Enjoying yourself, Severus?"

He turned his head sharply, sighing. "International magical cooperation," he drawled, "is exhausting."

Dumbledore chuckled, clapping him on the back. Leaning closer, he murmured, "And what news of Igor?"

"There is some," Snape replied, glancing around. "Let's speak later."

Dumbledore nodded. "You know where to find me," he said lightly as he moved away.

When Snape reverted his attention to the corner of the room where Karkaroff and the girl had been, he found they had disappeared. Clenching his fists at his sides, he scanned the Hall again before determining they had truly gone. He turned on his heel and stalked out, not sure which of them to curse first. He drew his wand and muttered a tracking spell, starting off down the nearest corridor with the glowing signals from the wand tip to guide him.

He found them backed into a narrow alcove many twists and turns away from the Great Hall, still clothed but with Karkaroff rutting against her where he pinned her to the wall. She was murmuring in his ear as she drew him closer, and Snape recognised the cadence of her voice. Veela magic. What the girl thought she was playing at, he had no idea.

He caught her gaze over Karkaroff's shoulder as he approached. Her lips parted and her gasps increased in both volume and drama, and _Goddammit_, he felt himself respond. The sight of Karkaroff taking what he could from her like that, and the sight of her letting him, sparked a jolt of desire and rage that shocked him. He dug the tip of his wand into Karkaroff's back, speaking with quiet venom.

"I thought I made myself perfectly clear last time, Igor. Leave the girl alone."

Karkaroff turned, his eyes flashing. "She is a Veela slut," he spat. "Everyone gets a turn." One of his hands slithered up the girl's body, squeezing her breast. She winced, her lusty act finally falling by the wayside. "You can have yours when I am done, Severus."

Snape rammed his wand in deeper, catching it under Karkaroff's shoulder blade. "I'll have my turn now, thank you," he growled, deciding to try a different tack. Karkaroff slowly raised his arms and began to back away from the girl. "Come near her again," Snape whispered, "and I will kill you."

The most alarming thing about that, Snape would have occasion to muse later, was that although he had no reason to feel obliged to defend this girl, he meant exactly what he'd said.

Karkaroff sighed, shaking his head. "You are no fun, Severus." He flashed a crooked grin. "You never were." He moved around Snape, his hands still raised in mock arrest, and stepped gingerly back down the hall. Snape turned to the girl, his eyes scanning her for injury.

"I am not hurt," she whispered, as if sensing his thoughts. "I am sorry, I simply thought–"

"Be quiet," snapped Snape, sighing. "I've no intention of–" A sharp pain lanced his right bicep and Snape ducked, throwing himself in front of the girl as he turned and raised his wand. Instantly, it fell to the floor from a silent spell. Before he could replace it with his outstretched fingers and retrain his mind for a wandless duel, the girl had wormed out from under him and fired her own wandless – and wordless, _Merlin_ – curse down the corridor.

He blinked at the sound of a body hitting the floor.

He made to grasp at her gown as she charged down the corridor, but she was faster. When he finally grabbed his wand again to follow, he found her crouched over Karkaroff's immobilised body, which was already bound and glowing with the hum of a magic inhibitor.

"Get his wand," he muttered.

She handed it to him.

"Bind his–" hands and feet, he was going to say, but she had already done that.

She glared up at him, her chest heaving, before wiping the back of one wrist over her brow. Strands of her hair had fallen from her neat chignon, framing her flushed face.

"Magic–"

"Inhibitor," she panted, rising to stand beside him. "It is done."

He struggled to catch his breath, gazing down at her with both fury and wonder. A million retorts flooded his brain, beginning with, _What the hell did you think you were doing?_ but he couldn't get any of them out. He couldn't stop staring at her, from the way her blonde hair caught the light, to the way her red lips curved in the corners, to the way her breasts rose from the filmy fabric of her gown. "Turn it off," he managed at last, squeezing his eyes closed.

Her breath was still coming in desperate gasps, but she shook her head. She had been looking at him with the exact same signs of desire. "It is not me."

"It has to be." She knew exactly what he was talking about. He moistened his lips and swallowed, trying to regain his composure, but even under his eyelids all he saw were tumbles of blonde hair framing her face and expanses of smooth skin dipping down into the cleavage of her gown. He was overcome with the need to back her against the nearest wall and peel that dress from her body. "_Stop_," he commanded. "Your magic will not work on me."

But as soon as he opened his eyes, he saw that it wasn't true. "It is not me," she repeated, her expression pleading, and then he couldn't hold back any longer, couldn't think rationally. He curled one hand around the back of her neck and pulled her close, claiming her mouth in a bruising kiss that lacked all finesse. She collapsed against him, gasping and grabbing fistfuls of his robes. His fingers crept up the back of her head and his thumbs framed her jaw. Parting his lips, he brushed his tongue against hers and groaned as she responded, her mouth warm and insistent against his.

He broke away at last and stood clutching her, his forehead pressed to hers. "Back to your carriage," he managed, pushing her away and turning down the corridor. He wiped his mouth and tried to steady his hands as he gripped his wand. After sending his Patronus to Dumbledore, he Disillusioned and then Levitated Karkaroff's body and steered it up to the headmaster's office. Not daring to glance back, he still noticed that he did not hear her shoes clacking on the stone.

He tried not to envision her standing there staring after him, her lips reddened, her hair tousled and her chest heaving.

Christ. He focused on not dropping the body as he walked. She was seventeen years old. He'd gone utterly mad.

He left Dumbledore alone to Ennervate and then suitably threaten Karkaroff should he try a stunt like that again on Hogwarts grounds. Snape and Dumbledore met up again later outside the Great Hall, just as the ball was ending. He told Dumbledore what he'd learned from Karkaroff thus far – that Karkaroff's Mark had been increasing in pain and visibility lately just like Snape's, and that if Snape's guess was right, Karkaroff would not hesitate to run if it got worse.

When the students began to thin out, Dumbledore said goodnight and moved off. Snape glanced across the main foyer to see the girl again – Merlin, he had to stop thinking of her that way – ducking demurely as Davies leaned in to kiss her. A wave of anger and envy rolled through Snape, but he clenched his jaw against it. Ridiculous.

But as Davies slunk off, she turned to Snape and saw him watching. She slowly hooked her thumb under the right strap of her gown where it had slipped down her shoulder, sliding it back in place before pushing her hair back. She began to walk towards him, her eyes never leaving him.

He didn't move.

When she was standing directly in front of him, he only gazed down at her and felt himself pulled under by the full weight of her magic. There was no sense denying it: he wanted her. More significantly, and for reasons he could not yet fathom: she seemed to want him, too.

"Come," he murmured at last.

He set off down the corridor at a brisk pace, turning towards the dungeons. Her shoes clacked as she followed, although she was careful to lag far behind. When the sound stopped, he paused to glance back over his shoulder. She was removing her shoes altogether. When she looked up and caught his eye, she smiled, then continued after him barefoot.

He raised his wand to Disillusion her, watching with fascination as she shimmered in the air and then disappeared. Then he set off once more for his rooms.

What was he doing? This sort of raw desperation was new to him; he didn't know what to do with it but _act_. He closed and warded the door behind him, removed the charm and felt the renewed tug of her magic as she reappeared before him.

"Do you believe me?" she demanded before he could touch her. "It is me, not magic."

"I don't care," muttered Snape, leaning down to kiss her again. Everything around him faded to a blur, and he broke the kiss only to ask her one question. "_Legilimens_," he breathed against her lips, their eyes locked, and her gasp of surprise was lost as he hurtled through her mind, grabbing at bits of images flashing before him. He saw himself in most of them, the way she watched him from afar, or manoeuvred to speak with him whenever she could, or asked Maxime for information about him. Then came the _other_ images, the ones that could only be her fantasies – of her dropping to her knees before him, or reclining on her back and spreading her legs, or this, just like this, pressing up against him and devouring his mouth as he moaned against her lips.

"Do not do that," she snapped, squeezing her eyes shut against him, but she was still panting, her breasts rising and falling against him. "If it is consent you need, then you have it."

The room stopped spinning for a moment as she tilted her head up, winding it all down to a crawl by brushing her lips slowly over his. She stroked over his tongue with the tip of hers, her lips parted, and then she pulled back again, blinking up at him.

There was nothing for it after that. He was inside her in seconds, blocking out all his doubts. He whirled her around to face the door and fell over top of her, unable to stop _needing_ her. With a soft moan, she yanked her gown up herself and snapped the edge of her knickers over her finger to move them aside. His hands shook as he tore his trousers open and gripped his cock. He kissed the back of her neck, hardly able to get enough of tasting her. He ran the tip of his cock along the seam of her tiny knickers – _God_, she was so wet – and then pressed inside.

She gasped as she took him in, her fingers clawing at the splinters in the door and her back arching. She pushed back and groaned as he slid deeper. It was wicked and base and pure, raw desire, but Snape clutched at it, needing to feel her flushed skin under his fingers and her warm body around his cock. His teeth scraped her shoulder, the strap of her gown falling down.

Her fingers brushed his cock as she worked them between her legs, and it was over so soon, too soon, with her shuddering underneath him and his knees nearly buckling as he emptied himself inside of her, hot and wet and desperate.

They stayed panting together for a long moment afterward. Snape felt his come trickle over his cock as it slipped free, and another shudder wracked her at the sensation. She pressed her forehead to the door.

If he'd thought their climax would break her spell, he was wrong. It was neither stronger nor weaker but consistently _there_, like a dull ache in his limbs that lessened only when he touched her.

As if sensing the strength of his continued desire and matching it, one of her hands slid down beside her hip to entwine with one of his. Snape closed his eyes, a strange sense of calm stealing over him as he breathed her in.

*

**ii. **

Professor Snape was up to something.

Fleur watched him as often as she could, a pastime she could neither stop nor explain. He drew her gaze wherever he went. She had to know _why_.

But he was on his home turf and he wasn't an easy man to follow. Not to mention that he wasn't the one she was meant to be following.

"Focus, child!" Madame Maxime scolded her as the first task approached. "You've _still_ no sense of what that traitor, Karkaroff, is up to?"

"He is evading me," she pouted, folding her arms over her chest. "He is much more interested in his group of boys than any of the girls from Beauxbatons."

"Fortunately, the Veela blood," said Madame Maxime dryly, "does not discriminate against such men. They are still fair game, if you choose to draw him in."

Fleur twirled a lock of hair around her finger. "He is weak, that is true. It would be quite easy, once we were alone. But..."

"What?" Madame Maxime smoothed a strand of hair back, glancing down at Fleur with impatience. "Remember, we haven't much time. The French Ministry needs to know if he is an ally, or if he remains a Death Eater." When Fleur didn't answer, Madame Maxime gave her a hard look. "You need not _actually_ sleep with him, child!" she exclaimed, throwing her hands up. "Why do you think that goblet picked you? You know more defensive magic than any student at these three schools! But men will tell things to a beautiful woman – you know this."

She did know that, and so she nodded, gathering her courage once more. The thought of being able to do something to make a real difference in the magical world was exciting. There had been whispers over the past few years of strange things happening at Hogwarts and in the English wizarding world in general. They all knew about the Dark Mark at the Quidditch World Cup, and the French Ministry for Magic, unlike some, did not consider it a prank.

The presence of Igor Karkaroff on English soil at nearly the same time seemed too big a coincidence. The Ministry wanted answers.

After lurking in the shadows of the castle enough times to catch Karkaroff in heated bouts of whispering with Snape, Fleur found that she wanted some answers as well.

"Headmaster Karkaroff," she called one night, her voice low and layered with magic. He paused in the empty corridor, glancing over his shoulder.

His gaze swept up and down her body before he answered, gruff and unimpressed. "What?"

Taken aback, Fleur nevertheless sidled up to him, running her finger down his arm. "I was supposed to meet with Viktor tonight for – well." She smiled. "Some international cooperation, you might say." Biting her lip and fluttering her eyelashes, her finger slid over his wrist and then continued back up his arm, tracing light patterns. "But he did not show up."

"Do not bother Viktor!" barked Karkaroff. "He is focusing on the first task."

He made to shrug her off, but she remained determined, moving closer to him. "Ah. In this case, I wonder if maybe... you could help me?"

His face shifted as he gazed down at her, a lecherous grin twisting his mouth. He reached out and grasped her chin between his thumb and forefinger, examining her face. "Well. I wonder if I could indeed." He licked his lips as his hand fell down her neck and under the shoulder of her robe, kneading her skin.

She swallowed around a wave of revulsion.

Behind her, a new voice spoke up, low and menacing. "Champion Delacour, is it?"

She glanced back, her lips parting in surprise. "If you do not mind, Professor," she said, trying to maintain her composure, "I was only speaking with the Headmaster about... a personal matter."

"Oh, I can see that," he said dryly. "Igor," he added, "might I suggest you refrain from consorting with the Beauxbatons – or, for that matter, the Hogwarts – champions?"

"The girl is throwing herself at me, Severus," said Karkaroff with an oily laugh, but he dropped his arm and backed away at Snape's glare. "Fine, fine. Perhaps a trip down to your carriage would do Viktor good, after all," he added. "Or the rest of my boys, hm?"

Snape drew his wand. "Get out of here," he snarled, his eyes flashing. Fleur stared at him. Karkaroff had already retreated down the corridor, shaking his head and waving his hand back at her in dismissal. When he was gone, he turned that menacing look on Fleur. "That was not wise."

"Allowing him to be chased off so easily?" she shot back.

Snape lowered his wand, but his eyes continued to flash at her. "You've no idea how dangerous that man can be," he said quietly. "Do not play games with him."

"It was not a _game_," she muttered, straightening her robes. "It was a mission."

Snape was silent for several seconds. "For whom?" he asked at last.

It was her turn for silence. She stepped closer to him. "If I tell you mine," she murmured, "will you tell me yours?"

He gave her a blank look.

The empty corridor stretched on either side of them, their whispers echoing off the stone walls. Fleur let the silence linger, and just as he was about to speak again, she darted her hand out and grasped his wrist, shoving his left sleeve up.

"_Stupefy_!" he hissed, just as she cried, "_Expelliarmus_!"

A fraction of his spell caught her before his wand toppled to the floor, and she stumbled, grabbing his arm even tighter for support. She blinked down at the curling green and black ink shadowed under the surface of his skin where his robe was pushed back. So, she'd been right.

He pulled his arm back and made to shove her off, but she held firm. Backing him against the wall, she used the only method she knew, now that she'd lost the advantage of surprise with her wandwork. Pressing her breasts against his chest, she breathed softly over his neck and traced her fingers up the bruised skin of his left arm. "The French Ministry enlisted me," she murmured against him, her lips nearly brushing his jaw and the magic she held over men beginning to heat through her veins. She pushed it forth. "They need information about Karkaroff, in case there will be a new war."

He stood stock still against the wall, barely breathing and trying to lift his chin to keep his mouth away from hers.

"Now tell me yours," she breathed. He was hardening against her, his cock swelling under her hip even as he clenched his jaw, presumably to keep it under control. She smiled. Useless. "I have seen you speaking with him, whispering," she added, moving her fingers down his chest and giving a mock gasp as she brushed past her nipple. "Are you working for Dumbledore? For your own Ministry?"

He let her fingers trail further down, catching in the folds of his trousers where his dick continued to pulse gently under the fabric, and she nearly thought she had him. With one swift movement, however, he grasped her wrists in both his hands and pushed her off, whirling them around to slam her back up against the wall. He was much larger than her and used his size to full advantage, crowding her against the cool stone. "Do you fancy yourself a spy, Miss Delacour?" he murmured, mimicking her ploy by letting his own lips brush over her neck and jaw.

A shiver raced down her spine at the contact, and she parted her lips, barely holding in a gasp. _God_. This was new.

"Do you think you are terribly important, infiltrating Hogwarts to perform such dangerous reconnaissance?" The tip of his nose slid over the shell of her ear, and he momentarily tugged her earlobe between his teeth before releasing it again. "It's very exciting work, isn't it?"

She let her head fall back against the wall, struggling to maintain her control. This was very, very new. None of the others had ever sparked this reaction in her. "Tell me yours," she insisted, folding her fingers into the fabric over his chest.

He pulled back abruptly, his dark eyes scanning her face. "There is nothing to tell," he said, his face blank once more. "You are a foolish girl with foolish ideas." He stepped back and brushed the front of his robes.

Panting against the wall, Fleur struggled to compose herself. "But– you–" she swallowed, creasing her brow.

"I what?"

"You– do not feel compelled to tell me," she replied, still eyeing him with confusion. She caught his gaze and held it, not feeling any penetration of her mind, not precisely, but rather being reminded of that same gaze on her at the Welcoming Feast months ago.

"No," he said at last, gathering his robes and setting off down the corridor. "I do not."

*

**i. **

Severus Snape had not glanced twice at a woman in fifteen years, but he found himself inexplicably drawn to the Veela girl.

Well, no. _Inexplicable_ was not the right word. The attraction was entirely explicable, even rational, given her magical properties. There were at least two dozen other girls with Veela blood at Beauxbatons, though, and thus it was quite probable that two or three of them, at minimum, were currently prancing through the Hogwarts Great Hall. And yet only one of them was holding his attention.

Curious, that.

Oh, he wasn't falling all over himself like the teenage boys in the Hall, all gangly limbs and sweaty underarms and untamed erections interrupting the Welcoming Feast, but he could not deny that he was affected in his own way. For a start, he knew he was staring. That alone was against his custom.

As the spectacle ended and the girls took their seats, the one he had been watching cast an open glance up at the staff table. Madame Maxime lifted her glass, Snape saw out of the corner of his eye, and the girl matched the gesture. But then her gaze moved down the table. When it reached Snape, she lifted her chin and gave him a smile.

It wasn't a shy, coy or flirty smile. It was a calculating, challenging, _clever_ smile. She knew something. Or, rather, she thought she did. He commended himself for holding her gaze rather than rolling his eyes. The young and beautiful always thought they knew things no one else did, that they would always be beloved, charming and indispensable.

He looked away at last, wiping his mouth with his napkin. Training his mind on the inevitable confrontation with Karkaroff that was sure to come later that evening, he brushed aside all thoughts of the girl. They were the result of base desires he would never act on anyway, so there was little point in entertaining them.

Settling back in his chair, he took a long sip of wine, adjusted the sleeve of his robe and forgot all about her.

 

-fin-


End file.
